REGIONAL> Development
|
REGIONAL> Development
|
|
Dazhou to be sulfur producing base
By Huang Zhiling (China Daily)
Updated: 2008-06-16 10:13
 Dazhou, a city in the easternmost part of Sichuan province, will make full use of its natural gas reserves to build itself into Asia's largest sulfur producing base by the year 2010. That's when its annual sulfur output is expected to surpass 4 million tons, according to Dazhou Mayor Luo Qiang. Located at the juncture of Sichuan, Hubei, Shaanxi provinces and Chongqing municipality, Dazhou, which has easy transport facilities, boasts natural gas reserves of 3.8 trillion cu m, of which 660 billion cu m are proven. "Dazhou, whose annual natural gas output is expected to reach 20 billion cu m in 2010, is one of the natural gas fields in China with the most promising development potential after the Tarim and Erdos natural gas fields," Luo tells China Business Weekly. Dazhou's natural gas has high sulfur content, and in some of its natural gas wells the content of sulfurated hydrogen from which sulfur produced is more than 17 percent. In recent years, Dazhou, hoping to become western China's natural gas, energy and chemical industrial base, has attracted domestic and overseas firms interested in its natural gas resources. Earlier last month, a Chinese subsidiary of the Chevron Corp announced the opening of an office in Dazhou to support the US oil giant's local natural gas operations. The move came after a 30-year production sharing contract signed between Chevron and PetroChina, the listed subsidiary of China National Petroleum Corp (CNPC), the country's biggest oil and gas producer, in December. In Dazhou, Jim Blackwell, president of Chevron Asia Pacific Exploration and Production Co, says the contract became effective in February. The contract, for the development of a 1,969-sq-km natural gas field in the onshore Sichuan Basin, made the CNPC-Chevron cooperation the largest inland exploration project by a foreign firm in China. According to Chevron, the company and CNPC expect to build two sour gas plants with a throughput capacity of approximately 740 million cubic feet of natural gas per day. The gas field has natural gas proven reserves of 175.97 billion cu m. |
